The Dark Journal
by PheonRen
Summary: Okthar is sent to recruit a Death Knight, and finds himself drawn to her as he discovers who she really is in the pages of a journal. He steals the journal, too fascinated to let it go... and in the end must deal with the consequences. Rated Mature for content.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: Someone who knew me from a forum asked me why I hadn't posted ALL of my Warcraft Stories. So if you enjoy the story, thank Minganisabeast (and check out his story!) u/1103797/_

_This is an orc and a blood elf DK. It contains violence, nudity, sex, and various other potentially offensive adult topics. It is fully written and complete, but will be posted as I get time, since people complain that my When Orcs Cry Freedom is only one chapter._

**Chapter 1**

The armor was staring at him, and he found it intrinsically disconcerting. It hung on a wood-frame tailor's mannequin beside the armoire across from him, the baleful blackness of the helm glaring at him with a deep malevolence. It seemed to whisper something to him, and despite its obvious evil, it seemed seductive and alluring.

It wasn't the kind of allure that the prostitutes had, nor the same sort of allure that the succubi had. It was a kind of soul pull; a tugging at him that caused him no end of discomfort. It was much like the calling of Discipline, but it was deeper somehow, more intimate and yet somehow grotesque at the same time.

He looked around the room again, trying to stare anywhere but at the cold black armor, and the icy blue sigils that crawled across it. He studied the sparse room, trying to find something interesting in the plain round bureau, or the matching armoire. Even the bed with its blue curtains couldn't seem to hold his attention.

When would the confounded woman be back? He'd been sent to interview one Sanabeau Del'Verys, and he wished he could get it done and over with. Then he could be gone from this place with its silently seductive sentinel.

His eyes once more drew back to the desk, and he studied its contents. Pens and paper. A small book- closed- with no title. There was nothing else, not just nothing of note, but literally nothing else.

Finally, as the moments ticked past, and he sat in the silent room, he stood up and began to pace. After some time, he couldn't take it anymore, and opened the book. He realized immediately that it was a journal. He sat it back down; he wouldn't read someone's private journal.

He went back to pacing, then sat down again. Time passed, and he found himself pacing again, stopping in front of the sinister armor. He just wanted to touch it. Just once…

He turned away, his breath speeding up. The seductive call of the armor and sword was immense, to pull a Shaman to it to such a degree. He swallowed and paced again. At last, more to distract himself than out of interest, he opened the journal again. Rationalizing it by his irritation at being made to wait, and also by the fact that he was here to get to know her and find out if she would be acceptable as a Horde specialist, he began to read:

_I am bitter today. I escaped the control of Arthas. With the others, I was freed from his grip forever. All those long months and years, I thought I would never be free again. I thought that my soul would be crushed before I could walk free again upon this land._

_Yet here I am. I am free, am I not? For isn't it enough to be free of Arthas?_

_No, I am no freer now than I was then. No, now I am a proud murderer- I mean, member, of the Horde._

Okthar's eyebrows rose as he read. She didn't sound like a very proud member of the Horde to him. But then again, from the date at the top, it was only a few weeks after she'd escaped from Arthas. Perhaps it was difficult at that time to be happy about anything. He tried to set aside the misgivings that arose in him from the words he had just read and continued:

_I kill now, just as I killed then. Is my life to be an endless eternity of murder and death and devastation?_

_And what, then, will they do with me when they no longer have any use for my skills? What shall I do, knit and make crumpets?_

_No. They will kill me as surely as they will destroy all the other instruments of death. I will be a reminder of all they have lost, and a threat to all they hold dear. I have become a destroyer, they cannot afford to let me live._

Okthar put the diary down suddenly, snapping the book closed in surprise. Something welled up in him, and he began to pace again, tapping absently on his right tusk as he always did when he was disturbed by something. An Orc, not a blood elf, could have written the words on the page.

He and his people knew well what it meant to be nothing more than weapons of destruction. The Orcs had been weapons in many, many battles. And when it was all over with, so thoroughly had they deprogrammed themselves from things like love and compassion, that giving up killing had been surprisingly difficult.

Self-preservation in times of war often meant becoming hard, very hard.

Yet somehow, though he'd read so little of it, the woman writing this page didn't seem at all hard to him. In fact, she sounded emotionally fragile, if such a thing could be said of someone who had worn that armor and brutally slaughtered hundreds of people.

He glanced at the offending armor, and felt it calling to him again. Resolutely, he turned back to the journal to escape its baleful stare.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

He continued to read, making sure that he listened for the approach of footsteps from out in the hallway:

_I suppose, though, that in many ways this might be a favor. For despite everything, I live for nothing now, but to protect these people. These people who so despise and hate me. If only they knew. How they would ridicule me!_

_I would that they might kill me now, and have done with it. Then I should be free of this strange sense of obligation I feel towards them. I would be truly free then._

_They ask me that sometimes. "What was it like? Being dead, I mean."_

_I tell them that I don't remember, but I do, I think. It felt like freedom. There was no pain. There were no demands. No guilt, nor shame, nor hate. It was as close to peace as I ever remember coming._

_And now it is all gone. Instead, I live this wretched half-life, this bizarre existence in which I find myself lost on the shores of duress. I am neither alive, nor dead. Neither horde, nor scourge. _

_The life I once lived is long since forgotten to me. I'm told I was a Blood Knight paladin. I've met some who knew me then. They tell me they know me, but they know only she-who-I-once-was._

_Not a soul in all the world knows me. Not one, even I._

Okthar sat the journal down, closing it quietly. He stood over it, contemplating that first page. He struggled between disliking her for her intensity alone, and pitying her for her inability to make a life for herself. It couldn't be that hard, many people had done it. Yet something struck him about her, why did she feel obligated to protect the people of the horde?

Perhaps more reading would answer that question for him. He picked the journal back up, and found the next entry dated some weeks later, though no pages were missing:

_An endless list of things to do. I am little more than a glorified mercenary now. I find the Hellfire Peninsula to be a harsh and unfriendly place. Not only in the land itself, but the hard, brutal people who live there. The continual interaction with the Legion has altered them to where they seem indifferent to many things which would horrify the common man. _

_Every day, I slay demons or tainted, warped beasts. I venture out and kill Orcs who have been turned into monstrous things, and I wonder at my own hypocrisy. Here I am, a creature stinking of death and murder and morbidity… and I take the lives of those who have consumed the blood of demons._

_As if they are evil, and I good._

_But I know that they let me live because there is little better in this world to kill with, than the very instruments of those you would wish to kill. So I, good and proper death machine that I am, kill. Day in and day out. Sometimes, even, I do it without remorse._

_Can you imagine if they knew I felt remorse? None would believe it, of course. After all, I too am a monster, am I not?_

_Of course I am, and lest I forget it, I go once more to kill. I am so very, very good at it._

He moved over to sit down in the chair he had vacated in order to pace the room after laying the journal down. He thought back on his time in Hellfire. It was definitely a harsh place, but he didn't remember it in quite the same air that she seemed to. Were the people really cold? It didn't seem so to him.

It occurred to him then that even his own people held a certain prejudice against these Death Knights. Perhaps she had experienced that prejudice even there in the Outland, the shattered remains of another planet that had nearly collided with Azeroth. He sighed and ran his hand across his face, a tired and worn gesture of uncertainty and doubt.

So many of the Death Knights deserved the ill will that was sent their way. They were brutal, cruel, merciless, rapacious, and savage. That being after they were released from Arthas' control. Light knew what they were like before that!

Okthar leaned back against the wall, letting the chair rest against the back of his heels, and looked up at the ceiling for a moment. He found himself wondering what it had been like for her, killing while feeling as she did. What would happen to her mind over time?

If there was one lesson their years of slavery had taught the Orcs, it was that, the more gentle the person before 'training,' the more likely that they became either the most brutal and best fighters—or were completely broken.

He wondered. By the time the Horde was done with her, which would be Sanabeau's fate?


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: They don't meet for a while yet. Okthar needs to get to know her a bit first. :)_

_This was another part of why I didn't post this one immediately. I don't feel it's all that great. But art unshared is art unappreciated, I suppose._

Chapter 3

He picked up the journal. There was no date at the top of the next page, so he began to read, wondering if something within the pages would give away the date:

_I was sent to Zangarmarsh last week. It was a long trip through treacherous territory, but I arrived with little trouble. I've found that I fear few things in this area. Probably an unhealthy thing for me, but true anyway._

_I found Zangar to be a strange place. The mushrooms, larger than trees, are strange enough in themselves. But the odd blue glow that seems to permeate everything seems unnatural and unsettling. Of course, I'm a fine one to talk, given the dark and damp nature of the Ebon Hold, and all of Arthas' other ugly, perverted haunts._

_Yet Zangar holds a certain charm, if you ignore how infested it is by naga. I intensely dislike naga, always have. It's these times that I feel that certain fascination with death that everyone expects me to have. When they send me to hunt them down, I finally understand the relish some have with being tasked with killing. Even more than I felt when I killed demons._

_Both, IMO are evil, and it's a great pleasure to kill them._

He was surprised to see "in my opinion" shortened in such a manner. So far, the journal had been meticulously spelled and punctuated fully. He wondered what that said about the mind of the woman writing the journal.

At the same time, though, he also considered her hatred of the naga. Was it some sort of vendetta? He hated them, as well, but far less passionately than she seemed to.

Then there was the fact that her name seemed so familiar to him. Where had he heard it before? He whispered it softly to himself, "Sanabeau." The source of the feeling of strong familiarity continued to evade him, and he returned to the slightly weathered pages of the book in his hands:

_I've changed a lot over the last weeks. I don't know if it's due to the constant time alone, or perhaps just time. I feel less like a total stranger in my own skin. I've become used to the fact that I eat only to repair myself. I know a lot of Death Knights—_

He paused again, re-reading the last two words. Spelled out. Perfectly capitalized and punctuated. He shrugged and went back to reading:

—_enjoy eating for the pleasure of it, but I find it a relief not to waste time on this bodily function. I've never particularly enjoyed eating, and the magic that sustains me without the necessity has grown on me. _

_But so often do I 'overhear' snippets of hateful conversation directed at me, that I know should I admit to taking even such a minor pleasure in any part of my existence, I would probably be strung up. So I keep this little secret, a treasure all my own. Yes, that's right. I enjoy being free of the need to eat several times per day, and to stop to eliminate._

_My body is more efficient than other people's bodies. It's a relief to find a reason to appreciate something of myself. It's a burden hating yourself all the time to satisfy the people around you._

Okthar sat back and contemplated the idea. He'd never really thought about it. Was this what was expected of the Death Knights? That they hate themselves?

He shuddered slightly. Yes, that would be a burden for any being. And while some of them had enjoyed their days with the scourge, he wondered now how many had suffered the same sort of chilling pain that Sanabeau appeared to have. He shook his head, it all seemed rather far-reaching. Too much to understand, to think of.

There were many implications of the journal he was reading. And he knew that at some point, he would discuss it with Thrall. Because, he reminded himself wryly, if there were any who might understand the plight of the Death Knights, it would be the Orcs. This much at least resolved in his mind, he returned to the journal. The next few pages were more discussion of her impressions of Zangarmarsh, and he skimmed them reasonably quickly.

Then, he heard footsteps approaching down the hall. Quickly, he set the journal down and stood as if he had been waiting only a few moments.


	4. Chapter 4

_A/N: Hi everyone. I apologize sincerely for the long time lapse between posts. Life here has been extremely hectic on every front. School starting back up, and significant, major life changes with regards to my daughter's diabetes. I am so, so grateful for your patience and your understanding as we [my family and I] struggled to deal with this huge life transition. With no further ado... story time! :)_

* * *

The footsteps continued down the hallway, and Okthar relaxed, then chuckled ironically. Caught looking at a girl's diary like a teen boy at his girlfriend's house. He felt both silly, and determined. He felt that this could be an important insight into the results of long term capture by the scourge.

He picked the book back up, still standing, and continued reading:

_Triciliana visited me today. She's very bubbly, cloyingly sweet, and determined to help me remember. Her words, meant well, sting and remind me more of what I am, than they do of what I was. 'We were friends once,' she says, reminding me that we are no more. 'You were so kind, so fun, always helping someone.' _

_Now, though, I'm just a monster. How could I forget?_

_Her visit was sweet in its way, but very draining. She is mourning her friend, and I get that. But how can she mourn her friend properly when I'm here? It's an ongoing, and never quite complete loss for her. She mourned me once, yet here I am again. But different in almost every way except looks and name._

_Every time she sees me, her hope is renewed. Every time she leaves, it's crushed again. Then she spends the next months reviving it enough to come find me again. Only to be reminded that her friend really is gone._

_I'm ashamed to admit, though, as painful as it can be to listen to her stories of what we did, of our lives as friends, I still enjoy the visits. She is the closest thing I have to a friend. She's very kind and sweet, though sometimes that is difficult to be around. _

_I regret that I still remember little of the life before. Sometimes I think that if I could remember it, I could be more like that woman she remembers. But then sometimes, I think it's a great grace. For if I remembered, then I too, would mourn the woman I once was. And I have no strength left for more mourning._

_Sadly, the woman she tells me about seems too good to be true. I guess that's the way many of us remember our loved ones when they pass._

_The visit was tense and difficult a lot of the time. It was bittersweet when she left. It will take me a while to readjust; everything seems so different, so surreal now._

_But you can never go back._

He set the book down on his lap, sighing. In an unfamiliar, strange way, he felt a sort of deep pity for both of these women. War was always hard, but how must it feel to see your loved one back, but so very different as to be nearly unrecognizable? And how did it feel to experience the expectations of those around you to be someone they remember, but you have forgotten?

Then he realized that he knew. Every soldier who survived any length of time in a war knew how this Death Knight felt in this part of her life. He had faced this expectation himself. The expectation to be who he was back then, and not who he was now. 'You can never go back' were words that any soldier could deeply understand.

With a soft grunt, he picked the nondescript journal back up. There were two more entries that talked about missions or her impressions of the place and the people. Interesting enough that he read them, but not so interesting that they pulled him in. She was a keen, astute observer, and he was impressed by her ability to relate the personalities of those she mentioned.

The next entry, though, caught his attention, and he read more slowly:

_Since Triciliana's visit, the nightmare has increased in frequency. I don't know if her visit triggered it, or if I fear losing sight of what I really am._

_It always begins in the same way, with the blue-eyed mother in the village. It was the first time I rebelled against Arthas. They sent me into the village to kill. I heard the terror in the voices of those I passed, but I was only killing soldiers, so I ignored them. They didn't seem real to me, just images or caricatures._

_I walked steadily to the town, slaughtering every Scarlet Crusader soldier who crossed my path. It was surprisingly easy. I found myself disdainful of them. They were weak and died easily._

_But now I was to kill citizens. The woman ran past me, and I slashed at her. I missed, but it didn't matter. She stopped and groveled. At first, I was irritated that she was so pathetic, so weak. But then she offered her life if I would spare her children. I told her that I didn't kill children. _

_Did I kill children? I can't remember. Who knows what I might have done before that day, it's all haze. But in that moment, a part of who I once was must have awakened. I told her that I don't kill children, and I meant it._

_She looked up at me, and cried. I felt sorrow for her. For her children, who would have no mother. Something about that tore at me, and I stepped back._

_Then I heard it, just as I do in my dream. Arthas' voice. "No mercy," he tells me in that resonating baritone voice. Of its own will, my arm begins to move. My body is no longer mine, an extension of him._

_But this time, I fight. My arm stops. My voice, so distant and unreal, tells her, "Run away." Instead, she continues to cower, tears rolling down her face. Her eyes meet mine again._

_His voice again, "Your compassion makes you weak." I am tormented by his condemnation. But still I fight him. I cannot raise my hand against her._

_Then from behind me, another Knight walks up. Casually, he cuts her down. The battle of wills was for naught, and Arthas laughs at my despair. I watch her blood as the enchanted armor sloughs it away. I stand, untouched, in a pool of it._

_This seems somehow symbolic of my life in general. Covered in blood that no one else can see. The dead standing in death._

_Her blue eyes will stare at me until the day I die—again. There can be no atonement for the failure to save her._

_And of course, now I know why it mattered to me that her children not become orphans—as I was. As I am now. We are orphans, all of us. Because not only can we not go back, but we cannot go forward, either, so long as the future promises only our death should we win this war of ours._

_There can never be peace for us. There is only war or death._

Okthar lowered the journal again. He was surprised to find that he was deeply touched by the words he'd found there. He sat for some moments, processing and thinking. He was sad for the unknown woman, but deeply saddened for Sanabeau, who had obviously felt so helpless and hopeless in the moment the other Death Knight had slaughtered the woman she'd just spared.

His eyes met the staring black helm. Suddenly, the armor's allure was tainted, its seduction now more overtly perverse and distorted. Yet it continued to exude that pull.

He shuddered and turned away. He was surprised to find that he was reluctant to pick the journal back up. What further horrors would he find in its depths?


	5. Chapter 5

_A/N: My thanks again to all who have reviewed. I also appreciate those following and favoriting. _

_Unfortunately, the return to school has given me little more time-perhaps even less than before. My daughter has transitioned to her insulin pump (she has type 1 diabetes), but it has been a struggle. We'll get there, but I just want to say that I appreciate how patient you have all been with me. I can't thank you enough for you patience and your kind words!_

* * *

**Chapter 5**

He read more anyway, almost compelled to:

_I went to Shattrath City today. When I left this morning, I couldn't wait to get there. I was so eager and excited, more fool, I. But then after I had been there a short time, I couldn't wait to leave._

_Everyone told me how beautiful it was. They told me all the great things I would find there. _

_They didn't tell me about the refugees. They didn't tell me about the beggars, with their haggard faces and their tired eyes. They didn't tell me about the way the land was trying to reclaim the place, grass and trees bursting up from it willy-nilly. _

_For all the beauty of the ancient architecture, it is a grim place. Soldiers train in the open, tight-lipped and determined. Warriors walk in tense silence, passing within feet of each other without acknowledgement. Tempers flare and tension is high._

_Perhaps we have become so accustomed to war that we no longer notice these perturbing signs of difficult times. Or maybe we just don't talk about it, for fear it will feel more real, more apparent, less hopeful?_

_Most of all, the thing they left out that struck me the hardest, was the orphans. They didn't tell me about the orphans._

_Some have asked me why my family doesn't visit me. I tell them that my family has passed on, so there are none left to visit me. What I don't bother to tell them is that they've been dead most of my life, not just since my death._

_I don't remember the orphanage. I don't remember the life I lived before, except in the barest parts of it. But somehow I've always known I was an orphan. When they told me after I returned from the walking hell of my death, I was unsurprised. I expected it, even. I never got in the lines to find out whom my family was. I never asked. They came and told me._

_They showed me pictures. Pictures of long dead people, smiling at the engineered recording device, it no doubt long since gone as well. Pictures of people I never knew, and never will._

_I don't remember how much it hurt me, but it must have, to have followed me into the abyss of death, through the depths of Scourge hell, and into the great beyond of this non-life. I almost wept when I saw the orphans there, listless and haunted-looking. Did I ever look like that? I must have._

_One of them looked at me, and we knew each other. Kindred souls, we orphans. It is only we who truly understand or know each other. Family of a sort, for we who have none._

_I hurried away, after that. I couldn't bear to see it—neither to see their suffering, nor the mirror of my own, unremembered spectral pain._

_Zangarmarsh's dusty streets and damp treelike fungus has never seemed more inviting than they did when I returned this evening._

Okthar laid the journal in his lap. He was surprised at this woman's level of sympathy, even empathy, towards the people of Shattrath. But more than that, he was surprised at the level of empathy that her writing evoked in him. He felt very tender and even rather protective towards this woman he'd never met. Or had he? He frowned, scowling at the book.

The name… It was so familiar. Why?

He shook his head, and stood again. He paced, even stepping out into the hallway for a bit, leaving the door ajar so he wouldn't be required to repeat his request to be admitted to the room on Official Horde Business—words that tended to open many a door throughout the land.

He stood in the hallway and stretched. He needed a break. A break from the book. A break from the staring, malignant armor. He shook himself, trying to come back to the present, to reality.

Somehow, although it was as real as he was, as real as everything else, the silent inn room seemed to be a world apart.

He found himself torn as he stood there in the hallway. He wished she'd get back, so he could conduct the interview and move on. One part of him desperately wanted to get away from her journal and back to his unshaken, simple world.

Another part of him wanted her to take her time. He was curious. He was interested. He wanted to read more—yet he didn't.

He wasn't sure how long he stood there in the hallway, gripping the banister that looked down into the common room below, pondering what he had read so far.


End file.
